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Jewels Of Opar Talinum Paniculatum Babies Breath Seeds

Packet of 150+ organically grown seeds!

I tried to buy this guy many times off ebay over the years, from many different suppliers, and in every single case it turned out to be a scam.
I just wasted my $ and more importantly months of my time growing something far less useful instead..
Very disappointing, so much so that I just gave up completely on about the 5th attempt.

Turned out fine in the end as I eventually managed to swap a plant with a friend of ours for some eggs.(We love barter if you have something cool!)
They didn’t even know what it was, just that it looked very nice with the pink flowers, and it had been happily self-seeding its way around their garden for years.

The reason I had spent a fortune over the years trying to get this Talinum Species are threefold.

The first reason is just as a hardy drought tolerant ornamental.
It’s a bit of a struggle to keep things alive here without additional water, the large bunches of tiny pink flowers do look really nice, and the native bees love it.
As one finished the next one is on the way and it looks pretty all the time.

The second reason and the main one, is I wanted it is as a vegetable.
The tuberous root ensures it survives even the toughest conditions and it is used extensively throughout Africa, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Venezuela, Central America, Panama, Mexico, Cuba, Thailand and big chunks of SE Asia.

It is really productive and produces an endless supply of succulent green leaves which are great when cooked.
You can eat the new shoots fresh uncooked too, but I reckon cooked is much better.
Chuck it in a soup or stew, on top of a pizza, fried with garlic, in pasta sauces, and as a general substitute for spinach or leafy greens, it works great and requires no inputs at all to grow.
Never had a drama with insects either, and the roos will leave it alone too if there are other alternatives.
In the hot dry times like now they eat it down to ground level if unprotected, but they have even been chewing on the hardwood tree stakes so that’s far from normal.
The leaves and shoots are quite tender, where as the soft kinda woody stem and tuberous root is awesome in a pressure cooker.
Just melts and falls apart and really thickens up a broth.

The third reason is because of its massive history as a medicinal.
In some parts of the world it is called leaf gingseng and is famed for treating or preventing pretty much everything.
Said to treat or cure diabetes, as a potent aphrodisiac, as a poultice or drawing agent, and to heal tropical ulcers.

Never tried any of that, and definitely don’t recommend it, but I suspect it would be good for infected wounds and cuts like most relatives are and personally wouldn’t hesitate using it on a wound that wasn’t healing.

The final thing I better say is while not a “noxious weed” anywhere, it is considered a weed by some folks, especially in moister places than here.
If you grow it in garden beds make sure you dead head the flowers if you don’t want it popping up nearby.
If you have more than you can handle just pull out the tap root and make a soup or stew.

Grown by me and the Mrs organically, no chems, no nasties no problems!!!

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